Trump files suit against Iowa pollster Ann Selzer and Des Moines Register newspaper

WASHINGTON — Donald Trump is suing Ann Selzer, her polling firm, The Des Moines Register and the newspaper’s parent company, Gannett, accusing them of consumer fraud, according to a copy of the filing reviewed by NBC News.

The suit, filed Monday night in Polk County, Iowa, says it seeks “accountability for brazen election interference” over a Nov. 2 poll that showed Kamala Harris up 3 percentage points in Iowa.

Trump ultimately won the state by double digits, a difference that his lawyers argue in the suit constitutes “election-interfering fiction.” The president-elect is making the claim under the Iowa Consumer Fraud Act, which prohibits deceptive advertising.

“I’m doing this because I feel I have an obligation to. I’m going to be bringing one against the people in Iowa, their newspaper, which had a very, very good pollster who got me right all the time, and then just before the election, she said I was going to lose by 3 or 4 points,” Trump said in discussing the suit on Monday.

Selzer announced after the election that she would stop polling political contests and move into other ventures.

The suit states that “Millions of Americans, including Plaintiff, residents of Iowa, and Iowans who contributed to President Trump’s Campaign and its affiliated entities (the “Trump 2024 Campaign”), were deceived by the doctored Harris Poll” and that the “polling ‘miss’ was not an astonishing coincidence — it was intentional.”

It attacks Selzer’s reputation as a standard-bearing pollster, accusing her of attempting to influence political races in favor of Democrats.

Rick Hasen, an election law expert at UCLA School of Law, immediately dismissed the lawsuit.

“I don’t expect this lawsuit to go anywhere,” he wrote on his blog.